Author: David Hunter

Housing Justice

• As announced by council president Nury Martinez Friday, the council will not vote on the municipal code amendment that would ban “sitting, sleeping, or lying down” within 500 feet of a shelter or supportive services facility, further criminalizing homelessness. Public backlash to the amendment took the form of public comments at the Homelessness and Poverty Committee meeting, and protests held outside the homes of councilmembers. Originally scheduled for a hearing in October, the vote was postponed to November 24 before apparently being cancelled entirely. Public resistance seems to have been instrumental in preventing council from implementing a brutal law that several councilmembers wanted. In announcing this move on Twitter, Martinez said that instead of voting on this ordinance, council will “continue to discuss homelessness on our city streets and work towards solving our unhoused crisis.”

• L.A. Taco updates the efforts of the community group Downtown Crenshaw to purchase Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza. The shopping center was earlier to be sold to CIM Group, outside developers who planned to redevelop the mall as “creative office space.” They stepped aside following community opposition. Since then, Downtown Crenshaw has continued trying to purchase the site, to maintain community control over the neighborhood landmark, and to make sure that plans to repurpose the site include affordable housing. However, after the latest round of bidding, the mall is scheduled to be sold to a second outside developer.

• Reporting in the LA Times uncovers how “crime-free housing policies,” designed to encourage evictions of tenants who have had encounters with law enforcement, and developed in concert with police departments in municipalities across California, are thinly veiled attempts to discriminate against Black and Latinx renters.

Coronavirus Relief

• Though Covid infection rates are rising, several economic relief programs instituted at the beginning of quarantine are due to expire this month.

Election Results

• Following the narrow defeat of Proposition 15, which DSA-LA endorsed, Capital & Main provides a brief analysis of the campaign.

• Incoming District Attorney George Gascón has announced his transition team and, on Twitter, one journalist covering criminal justice in Los Angeles sees promising signs that Gascón will pursue criminal justice reform.

Post-election Roundup

• Black Lives Matter Los Angeles led the opposition to Los Angeles District Attorney Jackie Lacey, both in the streets and at the ballot box, and this committed opposition was instrumental in her electoral defeat last Tuesday by George Gascón. This Monday, in a meeting organized by BLM-LA, Gascón met with family members of people shot by police. Though many celebrated Gascón’s victory, most recognized the need for continued vigilance in activist oversight of the office, even under a new, more progressive administration. Melina Abdullah, a founder of BLM-LA, said to Gascón, “This is a great first step, but we also want to make it very clear that we plan to hold you accountable.”

• In national media this week, a rash of articles deal with the potential fallout from the passage of California’s Proposition 22, which strips worker protections from Lyft and Uber drivers, as well as other workers in the gig economy. Lyft and Uber CEOs are feeling exuberant after their victory, and have spoken of taking the law “nationwide.”

• The advocacy of the Re-Imagine LA coalition was successful in passing Measure J, a county-wide measure that mandates 10% of the general fund be set aside for alternatives to incarceration. On Tuesday, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors took the next step toward implementation.

• The board also voted 3–2 in favor of exploring options to remove Sheriff Alex Villanueva from office, in response to Villanueva’s unceasing onslaught of deeply antisocial behavior. “Options” include impeachment, altering the state constitution or county charter, or simply limiting the duties of the office legislatively. Meanwhile, a similar proposal within the Los Angeles Democratic Party, which would officially call for Villanueva’s resignation, fell short of the 60% approval threshold. Instead, the party issued a strongly worded request that the sheriff try harder.

• The LA Times envisions the possibilities for a second stimulus bill under a Biden administration, with Republicans still plausibly retaining control of the Senate. Meanwhile, CalMatters examines the debilitated state of California’s unemployment protection program.

• More post-election speculation, as a treat: LAist tries to imagine what it might mean for the state to have a vice president emerge from California politics. Others make predictions for whom Governor Newsom will appoint to fill Harris’ Senate seat.

• DSA-LA congratulates Nithya Raman on her incredible campaign victory! Here’s an account, from a voice within her campaign, of why Raman was able to succeed in a city in which incumbent councilmembers are extremely difficult to unseat. It also presents a great diagnosis of the dire state of Los Angeles news media, and the emerging alternatives.

• Speaking of emerging alternative media, here is an article that ran in KNOCK.LA that asks what’s next after the election.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• Los Angeles County Supervisors Mark Ridley-Thomas and Sheila Kuehl have written a motion requesting a report on options to impeach or remove Sheriff Alex Villanueva. The Los Angeles Times explores what it considers the narrow, but not nonexistent, range of options, considering that county sheriff is an elected, not appointed, position. The motion will be heard by the board on November 10. Villanueva is up for reelection in 2022.

• As Angelenos across the city took to the streets to celebrate the Dodgers’ World Series win on Tuesday night, the LAPD and LASD ordered crowds to disperse in downtown LA, Echo Park, and East LA. The police used violent dispersal methods, including tackling and beating an LA Taco journalist with batons, and firing foam projectiles into crowds.

Housing Justice

• LA City Council spent hours debating Joe Buscaino’s motion to implement draconian “anti-camping” measures that would effectively criminalize being unhoused in Los Angeles. Thankfully, the vote was delayed until November 24 once it became clear that the motion would not pass. A substitute motion authored by Mike Bonin radically reframed the issue, reprioritizing increasing the number of shelter beds and improving the way they are allocated. Because of the delayed vote, this motion was also not heard.

• In March, families and individuals in need of shelter moved into several vacant homes owned by Caltrans. In the process of this occupation, they started Reclaiming Our Homes, which is supported by DSA. Now, as part of the City of LA’s transitional housing program, many will move into these homes legally. See their press release here.

Coronavirus and Relief Measures

• Los Angeles budget analysts released a report on Friday projecting a much greater pandemic-related shortfall in city revenue than had earlier been anticipated, with a potential outcome that the city’s reserve fund will be fully depleted. This has reignited the conversation over what cuts to services, or furloughs of city employees, will be implemented if the federal government doesn’t step in with relief.

Elections

• Remember that you have DSA’s 2020 Voter Guide to check out if you have yet to cast your vote in Los Angeles County. Also, you can still cast a ballot in California even if you missed the voter registration deadline.

Climate

• Southeast Los Angeles residents marched in downtown LA on Monday evening to protest the bankruptcy court decision that will now allow Exide Technologies to walk away from their lead-contaminated Vernon plant. The decision leaves it up to the state of California and its residents to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to clean up decades of toxic contaminants deposited by Exide into neighborhoods surrounding the facility. The protest, organized by East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice, highlighted the primarily Latino working-class communities that continue to be impacted by the toxic emission of lead and arsenic from the now shuttered Exide plant. “Why is it OK for us to live in poison?” asked protester and East LA resident Guadalupe Valdovinos. “To me, that’s an imminent threat. But we just don’t matter. We’re collateral damage.” Protesters left bags of lead-contaminated dirt from the front yards of Southeast Los Angeles homes on the steps of the federal courthouse. State and local officials have since criticized the ruling, while the Department of Toxic Substances Control is appealing the court’s decision.

Transit

• Widespread public outcry has now successfully delayed a plan to demolish hundreds of homes in Downey to widen the 605 freeway.

Housing Justice

• Councilmember Joe Buscaino continues to escalate the criminalization of the unhoused. This week he requested the city attorney draft an ordinance to ban “sitting, sleeping, or lying” within 500 feet of a freeway overpass or within 500 feet of a facility offering supportive services to the unhoused.

Education

• Los Angeles County recently implemented a waiver system that will allow some schools to partially reopen if they clear certain hurdles. Though the program was supposed to prioritize schools that serve low-income students, the first four schools to receive a waiver are private schools.

Elections

• Uber and Lyft have threatened to withdraw their services from California if forced to comply with AB5 and treat their workforce as employees instead of independent contractors. A stay was granted as they appealed an injunction forcing them to obey the law. This appeal has been rejected. However, the injunction doesn’t take effect for 30 days, and in the meantime Proposition 22, if it passes on election day, will specifically exempt them from compliance.

• DSA-LA made the news this week as Councilmember David Ryu attempted to make the organization’s support of his challenger, Nithya Raman, a political football in the homestretch of the council race in district 4.

Housing Justice

• Curbed (now a part of New York Magazine) interviewed Theo Henderson, an unhoused resident of Los Angeles who, through his podcast We the Unhoused, has become a powerful voice for his community. “It’s really hard to open [people’s] eyes to something they have intentionally hardened themselves against, and that’s what Theo does” says fellow unhoused activist Halcyon Selfmade.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• On Wednesday, the Los Angeles County Civilian Oversight Commission formalized its demand for Sheriff Alex Villanueva to resign, arguing that “Sheriff Villanueva enables a culture within the Sheriff’s Department of deputy impunity, disregards the constitutional rights of Los Angeles County residents, disdains other elected officials and disrespects the will of voters who support robust civilian oversight.” The commission can voice collective demands and increase public pressure, but has no legal authority to force Villanueva out of office.

Climate

• Yesterday, public comment was scathing at the bankruptcy hearing that would allow Exide Technologies to walk away from one of the worst environmental disasters in California history — which took place in the industrial city of Vernon. Dozens of callers, many of them citizens of the predominantly Latinx residential communities that neighbor Vernon, queued up to blast the decision. “We will be asked to live in our contaminated homes forever and to suffer for generations,” said one caller. “What gives you the right to let them walk away financially?” Nevertheless, today the bankruptcy settlement was approved.

Local Politics

• Newly elected Councilmember Kevin de León was sworn into office this week, two months early. He takes the seat formerly held by José Huizar, who is now facing corruption charges that compelled him to vacate his seat. As a state senator, de León represented the city of Vernon and was instrumental in protecting the scandal-plagued city from disincorporation.

• Governor Newsom’s May budget called for billions of dollars in cuts to services, but also included plans to reverse those cuts if federal aid came through before October 15. Here’s where California stands now that we know that, in the near term, federal aid is not coming.

Elections

• An interview conducted by The Guardian with both George Gascón and Jackie Lacey is extremely useful in clarifying important distinctions (as well as similarities) between the two candidates for Los Angeles district attorney.

• Proposition 21 would allow counties and cities in California to implement rent control in certain circumstances, easing restrictions put in place by the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act of 1995. In this debate hosted by KPFA, Rene Moya, housing advocate and campaign director for Proposition 21, makes the case for #yeson21.

Coronavirus Relief

• A furlough of Los Angeles city workers passed in September would have required 15,000 employees take one unpaid day off every two weeks, amounting to 10% pay cuts. A new agreement reached between Mayor Garcetti and several public employee unions increases the number of workers affected, but reduces the number of days off to only one between now and January 2021.

• After a two-week pause, Californians are once again able to apply for unemployment benefits. It is unclear how successfully the Employment Development Department used the designed pause to address its stated goals of accelerating the clearance of a massive backlog of claims.

Transit

• The city of Downey has released a statement opposing Metro’s current plan to widen the 605 freeway, which would require the demolition of hundreds of homes within the city.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• Last Friday, the Ad Hoc Committee on Police Reform met to discuss preliminary steps in developing a plan to divert certain 911 calls away from police and toward specialists in nonviolent crisis management. Pending a vote before the full council, the city will now undertake a search for nonprofit partners who can help them launch such a program.

• A report from the Los Angeles County Inspector General accuses Sheriff Alex Villanueva of maintaining a “code of silence” around the Banditos, a gang of deputies alleged to be operating within the East LA sheriff’s station.

Climate

• In the small city of Vernon, just southeast of LA and entirely zoned for industrial use, an Exide battery-recycling plant has been a major polluter, contaminating surrounding neighborhoods with toxic lead dust. Now, a bankruptcy deal brokered under the Trump Department of Justice may let Exide off the hook for tens of millions of dollars in cleanup costs.

Elections

• Don’t just take our word for it! Here are more progressive voter guides from KNOCK.LA and LAnd Magazine, (and both go deep on DSA-endorsed candidates Fatima Iqbal-Zubair and Nithya Raman).

• Also in KNOCK.LA: an explanation of why so many activist groups advocate voting No on Prop 25. Though SB-10, which 25 would uphold, would end cash bail in the state, the alternative system the bill proposes is worse, only increasing the leverage of a carceral criminal justice system.

State Politics

• September 30 was the deadline for Governor Newsom to sign or veto much of the legislation passed during the most recent session. Among the bills Newsom vetoed was AB 3216, which would protect California workers in the hospitality industry who lost their jobs during COVID, compelling employers to rehire the workers they fired instead of using the opportunity to hire workers with less seniority at lower salaries. In explaining his veto, Newsom parroted the objections of business interests who insisted the requirements were too onerous. A similar worker-protection bill successfully passed in Los Angeles in April.

• CalMatters provides more details on the bills Newsom signed and the bills he vetoed.

Education

• In September, LA Metro announced they were moving forward on the environmental review public comment period for a proposed widening of the 605/5 freeway. Metro has now backtracked, delaying public comment after criticism. Downey political candidate Alexandria Contreras pointed out that this proposed project would result in the demolition of entire POC neighborhoods.

• Investing in Place has teamed up with ACT-LA and other community organizations to address Metro’s service cuts to bus routes due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Metro cut approximately 20% of bus service due to the impact of the pandemic — a decrease of 1.4 million revenue service hours. They plan to keep those cuts in place until June 30, 2021. Advocates and community members criticize this plan, citing long wait times, overcrowded buses and unreliable service.

Housing Justice

• The Board of Supervisors has unanimously approved a plan for the county to purchase eight motels to serve as interim and permanent supportive housing, using funding from a grant from the state’s Project Homekey program, as well as CARES Act funding.

Education

• LAUSD’s Board of Education further discussed how to implement the $25 million defunding of the Los Angeles School Police Department passed this June, and how the money could instead be spent.

• The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a waiver process that will allow some schools to hold in-person classes for students in kindergarten through second grade. The waiver process is intended to give priority to schools serving higher percentages of students from low-income families. In other parts of the state, these waivers have overwhelmingly gone to private schools.

Climate

• An ongoing state investigation into SoCalGas has now revealed details as to how the utility, working with Imprenta Communications Group, leveraged local politicians across the county into advocating more lax emission standards for trucks at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

Elections

• Some polling numbers are in on many of California’s ballot measures. Prop 22, a measure financed by Uber and Lyft, and designed to exempt ride-sharing apps from complying with labor protections, is moderately favored to win.

• Check out DSA-LA’s 2020 Voter Guide!

Transit

• Despite widespread opposition, Mayor Garcetti and the rest of the LA Metro Board (with the exception of Mike Bonin) voted to slash the Metro budget by 20%, citing decreased ridership impacting revenue — even though federal CARES Act funding earmarked for maintaining transportation during COVID has held net revenue losses at only 2%. The cuts are primarily to bus service and will impact low-income riders of color the hardest just as ridership is beginning to increase.

Housing Justice

• Plaintiffs, including KTown for All, have won a legal motion, and now the City of Los Angeles will be held in contempt of court for violating an April injunction preventing the city from seizing “bulky items” belonging to the unhoused. A San Pedro sweep defied this injunction and posted outdated signs claiming that bulky items could still be seized.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• Black Lives Matter Los Angeles has been organizing protests outside of city hall every Wednesday for months. Hundreds joined this week, as thousands around the nation protested the lack of criminal charges brought against the Louisville police officers who killed Breonna Taylor.

• TW violent footage: An article on StreetsBlog LA explains how footage of the police shooting of Dijon Kizzee contradicts the claim from the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department that Kizzee was pointing a gun at the deputies that shot and killed him.

Coronavirus Relief

• The California unemployment department has paused logging any new claims for unemployment benefits until October 5 and has announced that they will take that time to implement a new system that will speed up processing times. A recent report found a backlog of over a million pending claims that will take until January 2021 to resolve, even with this pause.

Climate

• Last week, as record-breaking wildfires received national attention, Governor Newsom promised action on climate protection. This week, Newsom has issued an executive order banning the sale of new gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035. See here for a detailed analysis of how the order would be implemented and all the ways it falls short.

Elections

• An LA Times reporter live-tweeted the Sherman Oaks CD4 Candidate Forum, featuring incumbent Councilmember David Ryu and DSA-endorsed challenger Nithya Raman. Ryu was asked again if he is simply “Nithya lite.”

Transit

• Councilmember Paul Koretz has effectively killed Uplift Melrose, a plan to invest in making Melrose Avenue friendlier to pedestrians and cyclists. Uplift Melrose enjoyed support from local businesses and neighborhood councils, but was opposed by LAPD on the pretext that fewer traffic lanes would reduce response times — a concern not shared by many fire departments. LAPD has previously killed bike lanes in other parts of the city for similar reasons, for example at the request of NIMBY group Fix the City, which argues the city is “stealing” lanes from drivers.

Housing Justice

• Project Roomkey fell short of its goal of placing 15,000 of the most vulnerable unhoused people in vacant hotel rooms for the duration of the pandemic. Despite paying full price for rooms, the program was only able to find beds for 4,100 people. During a discussion about Project Roomkey at last week’s council meeting, Councilmembers Mike Bonin and Marqueece Harris-Dawson requested a report on the justifications supplied by hotels that declined to participate. That report was released this week, and it revealed that several hotels held out because of an open bias against the unhoused. It’s the second time in two weeks that city programs have been exposed as naively relying on the “reasonableness” of landlords and businesses; these interests’ most valuable assets are their class privileges, and they won’t reliably sell them at cost.

• LA Magazine published a story recognizing the successful efforts last week of community activists to draw attention to and push back against the illegal displacement of an unhoused encampment by the South Robertson Neighborhood Council.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• On Sunday, KPCC reporter Josie Huang was covering the interaction between sheriff’s deputies and a small group of protesters. While she was recording an arrest the deputies shoved Huang to the ground and arrested her. The Sheriff’s department issued a statement claiming she never identified herself as a reporter. This was later blatantly contradicted by video evidence in which she is heard shouting “I’m with KPCC” and is seen wearing her press badge.

• At Thursday’s meeting of the Los Angeles County Civilian Oversight Committee, which oversees the sheriff’s department, Commissioner Robert Bonner — known as a conservative member of the committee — shockingly called on Sheriff Alex Villanueva to resign. This follows the false report of the Huang arrest, as well as other recent incidents that have destroyed the sheriff’s relationship with the public and his ability to work with other elements of government. The call was immediately echoed by two of the five county supervisors. “He really is a rogue sheriff,” said Supervisor Sheila Kuehl.

Local Politics

• An article in L.A. Taco checks in on the Los Angeles District Attorney race between George Gascón and Jackie Lacey. The candidates met on a zoom call this week, where Lacey was grilled about contributions from police unions and her failure to prosecute a single LAPD officer for a police shooting.

• Mayors of five Los Angeles County cities that have legalized card room casinos met to lobby the city to allow outdoor gambling. The boundaries of many of the cities in the county have been drawn up to separate residential communities from the nearby industrial tax base. Some of these cities rely on card rooms for up to 50% of their tax revenue.

Climate

• Surveying the devastation of the historic, ongoing wildfires, Gov. Gavin Newsom broke with President Trump and acknowledged the scientific reality of climate change, calling it a “climate damn emergency.” But we are far past the point of debate. Scientists estimate that the fires in California this year have burned enough forest to emit about 90 million metric tons of carbon dioxide, some 30 million tons more than the total CO2 emissions from providing power to the entire state. The climate emergency is here. We are living through it. What matters now is action. Newsom said that he had directed two of his top environmental officials to review the state’s current climate strategies “and accelerate all of them, across the board,” but climate activists remain skeptical. As the COVID-19 pandemic has raged, critics have charged that Newsom has squandered an opportunity to move faster on reducing emissions, and has even slowed down or backtracked on climate action. Most recently, Newsom defended the state water board’s decision to extend the shutdown deadline for four gas-fired power plants that were supposed to close this year.

Housing Justice

• In June Los Angeles passed the Emergency Renters Assistance Subsidy Program, establishing a fund to help tenants struggling to make rent during the pandemic. Instead of providing assistance to tenants, the program was designed to make payments directly to their landlords. However, the program required that landlords agree to some terms — such as pausing evictions during the pandemic — in exchange for the money. Now, tenants in the program have reported that their landlords are refusing to take the subsidy — echoing outcomes in similar programs nationwide — leaving tenants in the lurch.

• Members of the South Robertson Neighborhood Council (SORO NC) raised $3,650 through a GoFundMe with the explicit intention of illegally displacing unhoused people under the Cattaraugus underpass in West LA. On Sunday, they removed the belongings of unhoused residents and put down boulders in their place. Volunteers from Ktown for All, Street Watch LA, and Los Angeles Community Action Network successfully drew public attention to the incident, directing Angelenos to call into the SORO NC meeting’s public comment, as well as provoking a response from South Robertson’s Councilmember Herb Wesson. By the end of the week the boulders had been removed.

• Following some debate over funding levels, the Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously to approve $97,000,000 in funding for the “Rapid Re-Housing” program, to be administered by LA Homeless Services Authority.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• For several days, protesters demanding justice for Dijon Kizzee staged peaceful demonstrations outside the South LA Sheriff’s Station. But the conflict escalated over Labor Day weekend, when sheriff’s deputies fired projectiles and chemical irritants into the crowd, injuring several. No justification has been provided by Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department for the escalation, and activists present report that it was unprovoked. Over the following few days of protests, deputies began making arrests, with 35 arrests made as of Tuesday.

• In a bizarre and upsetting press conference staged by County Sheriff Alex Villanueva in response to the Dijon Kizzee protests, a series of speakers supposedly representing the South LA community — including someone with ties to white supremacists — addressed “outside” protesters to insist that they were not welcome. Spokespeople for Kizzee’s family pushed back on Instagram, insisting that all peaceful protesters were welcome no matter where they were from.

• The open existence of gangs within the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department has become a national story. Zak Cheney-Rice writes, “The particular incentive structure that governs gangs like the Executioners may be eye-catching in its boldness. But it also typifies policing in places where they do not proliferate so literally.”

Labor

• AB5, a law passed last year in California, mandated that many “independent contractors” be reclassified as full- or part-time employees. Now, Governor Gavin Newsom has signed into law AB2257, which creates exemptions for several professions, including journalists and musicians.

Climate

• AB 2147, which removes some of the barriers that incarcerated firefighters face in becoming professional firefighters after they are released, was also signed into law this afternoon.